#satine critical

[antianakin]

I wonder how Satine "There is no extremist who cannot be reasoned with" Kryze would have felt about Palpatine after he named himself Emperor and wasn't hiding his Sith identity anymore. Would she have maintained that he could somehow still be reasoned with or would she have finally realized that sometimes certain people are too dangerous to be reasoned with and attempting it just puts more innocents at risk.

[2stepadmiral]

Maybe sort of a hot take? Satine Kryze was a terrible leader and kind of a petty tyrant. Like, look at what she actually did and how she did it and what the consequences were:

She committed effective cultural genocide against her own people by eviscerating a millennia-old culture/creed/tradition/religion, removing the at least 80% of it that she didn’t like and demanded that everyone else adapt it

Those who refused to relinquish their ancestral ways were exiled from their homeworld and even robbed of their cultural identity when she claimed that anyone who still practiced the warrior ways were not true Mandalorians

By enforcing this ‘my way or the highway’ policy, she created the environment where Pre Vizsla could form Death Watch and recruit all the followers he had out of the disillusioned she had branded as outcasts

By enforcing her strict pacifism, she disarmed her people and even her security forces, leaving the planet defenseless against both Death Watch and the Shadow Collective (imagine if the Yuuzhan Vong had invaded during this period)

Publicly belittled and insulted a high profile General in the Grand Army of the Republic/ Master and Council member of the Jedi Order in front of a number of Senators and her courtiers because he dared to point out that the Separatists might not let her remain neutral

Publicly stated that she didn’t want Jedi security present when traveling with a retinue of Republic Senators in the midst of a terrorism crisis that she was the main target of, in front of a number of people who would have been put at risk had she gotten her way

When Obi Wan pointed out that the Senators and likely her courtiers had requested Jedi security due to concerns for their own safety that she had disregarded, rather than acknowledging her thoughtlessness, she again insulted Obi-Wan and provoked an argument that she aggravated into a bickering session while Obi Wan tried and gradually failed at keeping civil

She seceded her world from the Republic rather than allow the slightest impression that she endorsed the Clone War (never mind that Alderaan and Naboo were prominent members of the Senate that opposed war and actively worked to end it peacefully and quickly without seceding), which forfeited the government aid Mandalore needed to survive in its damaged state and led directly to Prime Minister Almec having to use the black market just to keep the people fed

And in the end, all she accomplished was a maybe fifteen-twenty year period of relative peace before civil war broke out again, Maul took charge, the Empire forced fifteen years of relative obedience, and ultimately the planet was bombed and the Mandalorian people were decimated. The role of a good ruler or leader is to do what is best for your people, even if it’s contrary to your own preferences or interests, and Satine consistently made her own beliefs the order of the day, enforced from the top down. Had she moderated her approach, maybe tried to redirect the warrior tendencies into galactic peacekeeping, or advocated for a warrior second, hardworking builder/farmer/pilot/tradesmen helping to rebuild Mandalore first (sort of what Boba Fett did as Mand’a’lor in the EU), despite her personal disdain for violence and warfare, she could have been one of the greatest Mandalorian leaders who affected real change. Instead, she allowed her personal priorities to be the priorities of her regime and the guiding principle of her tyranny.

[airasilver]

Ah, I couldn't remember for sure how many Jedi survived so thank you for that answer. (I did remember only Jango survived of his group.)

I forgot about the Children of The Watch! I love Din and can't believe I forgot about his faction. (I wonder if it's because there is a fnaon theory that Pax is actually the son of the Commander of Death Watch during TCW, I forgot his name.)

So us calling them True, New, etd isn't fanon only. I probably have it on my blog somewhere but good to know if I don't.

Thank you for the resources on Satine. I could probably like her...if they had done her correct and not make me hate her for how she treats everyone, except a certain few, around her. Bo-Katan is worse and then just the same to me.

There's a poll that is Satine vs Cody and Satine is winning and people seem to hate us that are critical of her. Even though a lot of us have good reason to be.

It's just like people saying deaths should not be celebrated but then celebrating some anyways. Or saying the Jedi is nevwe wrong, not a lot mind you, but Anakin can't be redeemed, ever.

I guess it is just us humans being humans.

So question..how the fuck are the clones not Mandalorian when Boba is? When Jango is? Or did Disney decide that they aren’t anymore (Jango and Boba)?

I thought they had made Jango Mandalorian and then took it away and then brought him back in. So wouldn’t the clones, who hold his DNA be Mandalorian?

If Boba is Mandalorian, the others should be also.

Wait! Does this mean Jaster isn’t Mandalorian either?

[ominouspuff]

.

[impossibleprincess35]

Politely and respectfully, I speak calmly into the void:

In the conversation about Satine's pride leading to the Shadow Collective and Maul gaining ground in Mandalore, I must disagree. Satine's pride had nothing to do with it because so long as Pre Vizsla and his quest for power was a factor, Mandalore was doomed.

Maul and the Shadow Collective didn't scope out the galaxy and find a flaw (re: pacifism) in Mandalore and go, "Oh, hey, there's our opportunity to infiltrate."

Pre Vizsla and Death Watch manufactured a plan in which they opened up the pathways and allowed Maul and the Shadow Collective to flood Sundari and stage a scene to undermine Satine's rule.

(I could write for hours about my thoughts on parallels between the attack on Sundari and the real life insurrection on the U.S. Capitol on 1/6/21, but I'll spare you all.)

Pre Vizsla committed acts of treason and endangered his own people, caring about nothing other than his goal of obtaining the seat of power with the weak justification that he would restore Mandalore to its warrior past. Bodies are dropping, people are being traumatized, and he's orchestrated these things - and he had to orchestrate them because otherwise, Mandalore was peaceful and safe.

And it wasn't just one event.

You had the attack on Sundari, but also the Peace Park bombing, and the incident on Concordia when he tried to kill Satine and Obi-Wan; and here's the thing about that, Obi-Wan was a visiting Jedi Master/General of the Grand Army of the Republic. Maybe the Republic would have turned a blind eye to Satine's death, but Obi-Wan's? Republic forces could have been on the ground in days with a full scale invasion. Such prowess! Much strategy! Wow.

Keep in mind, Pre thought he was going to double-cross Maul, throw him and his brother in a prison cell, and sit around victorious in the Grand Salon as if he had earned the throne through real merit. Had he been a real warrior and worthy of leading Mandalore, he would have achieved the seat of power through honorable means; but his pride led him to seek an alliance with shady crime syndicates and a fucking Sith, which was never going to work out in his favor.

And in the long run, what kind of ruler would Pre Vizsla have been if he hadn't been beheaded by Maul? His entire rise to power was built on deception. He would have become an absolute nightmare, wielding fear and the Darksaber, but not towards "enemies" in the galaxy, but towards his own people and those closest to him in an attempt to keep his power.

And what happens when Pre dies? Death Watch crumbles. The schism is profound and no one immediately rises up to carry on the work and keep the faction together and operational. Because what was the work? It was never really about restoring Mandalore to some glorified past. It was about Pre Vizsla's quest for power. Not even Bo-Katan honors the ways of their warrior past when Pre is bested in a duel for the Darksaber. Because it's never been about their warrior ways, so much as it was about Pre wanting the throne. (This paragraph is complete conjecture, but it's what I think and I'll die on this hill.)

Was Satine prideful at times? Yes, but blaming her for the fall of Mandalore is tantamount to finding no fault in Pre Vizsla's never-ending efforts to create conflict where there was none, all so that he could sit upon the throne for a few days until Maul rightly rocked his shit.

[marvelstars]

I do like TWC cartoon because it felt like an oportunity for us fans to see more of our fave characters in a day to day basis and it gave great and individualized personalities to clone troopers to let us know they are people under their armor but I agree with some fellow fans that in some chapters the show takes shortcuts and instead of delving into Anakin´s character when he makes decisions which should by all rights affect him emotionally, they play it for a joke because he will be "Vader"so it doesn´t matter or the show adds extra trauma that should be explored, see the Queen of Zigerria or his rescue of Jabba´s Son or the microchip in clone soldiers heads(the only difference between them and child slave Anakin was that Anakin´s had a bomb while the troopers are forced to obey or the chip makes them more obedient to the Jedi or members in the military) but TCW only shows Anakin mad in general at all those events while the other characters act as if he didn´t had a reason to get mad or he is exagerating because he is a "bad Jedi" tm because aparently his main problem is that he "cares too much" but it isn´t wrong to care and he isn´t wrong that they probably should be doing more for those situations that they are currently doing but the show doesn´t show it and this flattens Anakin´s character and I believe it also flattens the characters around him.

For example Satine and Obi-Wan

This moment is played for laughs while Satine and Obi-Wan seem to have next to zero reaction to Anakin´s action because after all, the man killed was indeed ready to kill them and all the people on their ship with a bomb and if he keep himself hidden he probably would have tried to murder Satine until he managed to do it.

Still I am not a fan of "good guys" who don´t want to kill or have doubts about the idea of murder but are totally fine with other characters who are their allies doing it for them so they keep their hands "clean". In the show Obi-Wan does this with Rex and Anakin. Neither when shows use this trope as a joke.

That makes them hypocrites because they are involved in the murder by accepting or ordering it even if they didnt do the deed themselves. The fact this doesn´t bother them shows they didn´t personally care that much about the act of murder itself, just about the fact they had to do it because it´s distateful for their self image of being a "good person" it´s fine for their allies, already used to violence to do it for them, they are already "grey" but not for them because they are "good". So imo they are also in denial about their personal responsibility in the whole issue.

Obi-Wan didn´t have a problem to cut off a guy arms for speaking rude to Luke in ANH which is the first time we meet him as a character, I don´t think he would hesitate so much in this instance just because Satine is there, he is in canon a pretty pragmatic guy and Satine is a planetary leader who probably had to order the use of force to tackle security with death watch involved in many confrontations with her goverment and if we include the years in which Mandalore was under civil war it´s possible she had to use force to protect herself or her family.

I do understand this was done in jest and to involve Vader´s theme but this definitely wasn´t a Vader kind of situation imo and I believe its interesting to analyze the character deeper motivations and this scene deserved more depth than the one given.

This is also why I regret the show never showing Anakin´s first years as an active general in the war on Bespin, that was a formative moment for Anakin as a leader and warrior and it explains so much about his characterization later in the war but also his trauma over death, the reason why he is so protective of the clones, his master, Ahsoka, Rex, Padme, Palpatine, etc.

[bosooka]

every so often i open the satine tag to see another post that starts "umm maybe this is a hot take but i don't like satine" followed by a take that could freeze hell over

[sherlockholmeshound]

whenever ppl try to come up with some version of 'romance and love isn't forbidden by the jedi, on this one novel-'

i'm just...

[bookatans]

This is probably going to be a very long post but the more I think about the rise (and subsequent fall) of the New Mandalorians, the more that I get wrapped up in not only the colonialism committed by Satine and the movement, how it began in such a horrifyingly understated way, but also how it paved the way for Mandalore to be destroyed thanks to the almost-complete erasure of their culture.

First of all, Canon verse deciding to remove the True Mandalorians (and placing the "Old" Mandalorians in a similar, though less prominent position) feels particularly underhanded and paints everything in a black and white manner. Satine: a sympathetic character who is the only one standing against Death Watch, the last shred of peace left for Mandalorians to cling to. Which. Last standing? Yes, definitely. But not the only one.

A war where Death Watch and the New Mandalorians were the major players, only to have Death Watch defeated – even with the assistance of the Jedi keeping Satine alive – makes little sense from a technical standpoint. Is it impossible? Probably not. All sorts of things can happen in history, pure dumb luck makes every difference, but it's unlikely. A party which seeks peace is not going to survive against another ultra violent, volatile party that's pissed off at you because you want to erase the culture that they so deeply value.

Which, yeah I don't buy it. Even with the Republic stepping in later on, it's fishy. But for the sake of my sanity, I'm mostly focusing on Legends, because the more you try to create a coherent timeline (seriously, how is Clone Batch Math easier than this?) for the Mandalorian Civil Wars, the harder it is not to give up entirely.

Anyways. Satine did not survive years of conflict due to mere smarts and perseverance, and did not end the war by being charismatic and having good people skills. She was the LEAST THREATENING PARTY in a three-party war, hunkering down with her Jedi protectors and playing politician while the actual warriors in the conflict weakened one another and – for the True Mandalorians – were wiped out.

True Mandalorians. Death Watch. New Mandalorians.

So, okay. The approximate dates of the beginning and end of the Mandalorian Civil Wars don't necessarily make sense with Satine’s age. She'd have been slightly younger, and Canon seems to have a tendency to just wave their hand in the general direction of a time period and deflect onto another topic.

Which, you know what? Fine. I can work with that without having to think too hard about the dates. It kills me not to delve into it further, but. No. It's not like Disney's gonna pay me to fix their broken timeline.

(But if I had to, I'd shift Jaster's death to 47BBY instead of 52BBY, and push the Battle of Galidraan a year back to 43BBY, and—)

Here's what's important to remember, though:

- There are two Mandalorian Civil Wars. The first being True Mandalorians vs Death Watch. The second being the much shorter, and quickly solved Death Watch vs the New Mandalorians.

- The massacre of the True Mandalorians happened shortly before the beginning of the second civil war.

- The True Mandalorians had already been dealing with Death Watch for years, and they were winning. Death Watch wasn't just on the run, they were weak, they had to resort to TRICKING THE JEDI into killing the True Mandalorians for them.

Who wasn't weak? The New Mandalorians, the people that actively choose to turn their back on a culture that had survived for centuries. And yes, Death Watch remained even after the True Mandalorians fell. Tor Vizsla targeted Satine and the New Mandalorians viciously after that, there was even more destruction, but it wasn't with the severity with which he'd prosecuted the True Mandalorians.

Here's what happened next: Jango Fett escaped his enslavement. He hunted down Tor Vizsla, and he killed him. Whatever strength Death Watch had regained in those few years didn't matter, because the second their leader was gone they were certainly left unorganized and at a disadvantage.

Giving the New Mandalorians the opening they needed to cement in people's minds to their beliefs and convince the House and Clan leaders that abandoning their old ways was the solution. After all, how much more of Mandalore was left to destroy? How many more had to be lost?

With the public's approval and the Republic’s help, Satine Kryze and the New Mandalorians scavenged the corpse of Mandalore, and they took what they deemed fit, left the rest to rot and – given time – be erased completely.

What's worse is that Satine's activism and speeches made it sound like that made sense (because, to Satine, it did make sense); abandon what Mandalore once was because that's the reason we've been destroyed, isn't it? (Not entirely untrue.) And these people, whose world had been ravaged, who's clans and families had wrecked everything with in-fighting, were tired and desperate enough that they listened.

Actually, here's what's really worse — Satine got LUCKY! The first time! It should not have ended like that. But because she got lucky, because it worked once, she tried to do the exact same thing when the entire galaxy went to war. And she ignored the suffering of people whom she should have known empathy towards, who were going through the very same torment she experienced as a child. Because her position of superiority where peace is the only answer was so ingrained in her beliefs, because she was ARROGANT.

And because peace was the only answer, because she'd disavowed any sense of warrior culture from her people, Satine had as much a hand in dooming Mandalore as everyone who went in with the worst intentions. Does it matter that it was doomed regardless, because Maul was the great evil that came to destroy them? No. Maul was just the most convenient means to an end the resurrected Death Watch could find, but if not him it would have been anyone — anything – else.

I do feel for her. She had to experience her father's death so young and step into a role he'd left behind, didn't get a proper chance to grieve because she had to be strong for everyone else who was grieving. She gave up the possibility of love for duty. Satine was a good leader, I won't argue that, and she was the last stand between Mandalore and total annihilation, but she was also deeply flawed.

[fanfic-obsessed]

Hi! Hope your August is off to a good start. Could I send a prompt for Talk Shop Tuesday?

Feel free to ignore the prompt if not!

Some or Several of the trainers look at the babies with their alor's face that said alor wants them to train for a war and go "we think the fuck not.

@somestorythoughts Sorry I did not answer yesterday, it took me a bit to get my thoughts in order for this.

Look there is never a bad time for me to receive a prompt,  a question, or a random message.  It brings me great joy.

Now For the Prompt:

Some or Several of the trainers look at the babies with their alor's face that said alor wants them to train for a war and go "we think the fuck not.

My first thought, before anything, is that Mij is the ringleader. There is no doubt that the medics would be the ones to spearhead this and Mij, of all of them, best remembers both Jaster and little Jango.

I also think that the medics do not really know what the babies are really there for at first. If we think about the Psychology of Jango Fett- Orphaned twice over, a leader too early, the death of his people (that he 100% will not face is partly his own fault-as he shot first) and his own enslavement, semi forced addiction to Spice from the aforementioned enslavement. While none of these things makes Jango evil, they do make him a bit broken. I do believe that in this one he is lying to everyone. 

He is telling the Kaminoans that he is training what will be the GAR (it does not matter if they know the full plot or not, Jango thinks they don’t). He is telling Dooku that he is honing the clones into a weakness for the republic and a wake up call for the Jedi while knowing Sidious’s actual plan for the clones. Of the trainers, he is telling some that the clones will be a trap for the Jedi, others that they will be getting some enormous payment, while telling still others (like Mij) that he is planning to steal the clones to rebuild the True Mandalorians, assuring the interested groups that he is working for the best of Mandalore. 

Most of all Jango is telling himself that he has not become worse than any of the crimes committed against him. 

It is all lies. 

For the first year, this house of cards remains standing. Jango has convinced most of the groups he is lying to that he is lying to everyone but them. Not that all of them care, but some do.  

It is such a small thing, in the grand scheme of things, that tips Mij off. Jango has managed to explain away the numbers (to give the clones a chance to name themselves), the lack of armor (that much armor is expensive), and other such discrepancies as necessities for ‘tricking’ their employer. 

It starts with a single look. A microexpression when Mij asks Jango to hold the toddler A-17 during a routine check. Disgust. It stuck in Mij’s mind all the harder, as he had just witnessed Jango with Boba not 10 minutes prior. 

Mij started to, discreetly, poke around. It takes him all of a week to find the chips. The slave chips embedded in the heads of babies. The babies with Jango’s face and slave chips in their heads. 

Mij has made an error. Mij.exe is also experiencing an error.

Everything is an error. 

Now Mij has a choice, and both those choices involve breaking a vow he swore so many years ago to Jaster Mereel, and later to Jango Fett. He could choose ignorance, and follow his Alor, convince himself there is a good reason for what he is seeing; pretend that there is any good reason for slave chips. And thus dooming untold children, untold babies, breaking his moral code irrevocably. Or he could choose the babies, could undermine his Alor, betray the trust that Jango had in him. Be one more person to abandon Jango, the boy that Jaster had adopted and loved. 

The choice was not an easy one, and it hurt. It hurt worse at how careful he had to be, gathering allies. The remnants of the True Mandalorians were bound by trauma and shared hell. It was excruciating, having to keep secrets, but Mij knew that not everyone would make the choice he had. Not everyone would choose the babies. He could not begrudge them, but he could not trust them either.

It took another month of wrestling with their choices before Mij and his allies, 14 other former True Mandalorians, came to a decision.  There were not enough of them to wrest control of Kamino, not enough to take the 10s of thousands of babies away and keep them safe. They debated going to the Jedi, having realized that the Jedi ordering the Clones was just another lie, but the Jedi were bound to the Republic. They could not protect or free the babies. 

There is only one group that could, politically, if not physically. One that Mij did not want to go anywhere near. Knew that he would have to give up what made him Mandalorian; that he would have to give up the Mandalore Jaster Mereel had envisioned.  By the end of the month, all 15 were in agreement that there was no other way.  

Though it took time, and careful planning, Mij makes sure to be holding a now toddler A17 when his call finally connects to Satine Kryze. He can feel her gaze slip to the baby in his arms as he pleads his case to the Duchess of the New Mandalorians. As he agrees to whatever hoops she wants them to jump through, if it would mean that the children are safe and loved. 

His Ancestors who marched ahead would be angry that he would give up their culture, but they would despise him for abandoning the babies to their fate.

[azurecanary]

So if the Jedi's practice of zero attachment was what led Anakin to the Dark Side, then why didn't Obi-Wan go all Vader-y when Satine died?

Is it maybe that Obi-Wan understood the Jedi Way? And wasn't into committing genocide?

[antianakin]

I feel like I've seen a lot of "Empress Padme" or "Sith Padme" stories where Padme's gets pushed to a breaking point and becomes evil or convinces herself into doing evil things in the name of justice, and while that's all entirely valid, I feel like I need more Empress SATINE stories.

Because Satine is, canonically, someone who is absolutely willing to go for torture and wrongful imprisonment when pushed far enough. She is someone who will performatively destroy things just to prove that she's "against corruption." Satine is someone who will see the consequences of her own choices happen and refuse to take an ounce of responsibility for it.

So I can absolutely see Satine becoming a violent tyrant while convincing herself and telling everyone else that she's just getting rid of corruption, she's just doing what has to be done. She will purify the world and anyone who tries to get in her way is just part of that corruption and will be eliminated.

Like maybe this is in an AU where she doesn't die during the attack by Maul and Death Watch, she manages to survive, but then she lives through the rise of the Empire and instead of being deposed by Gar Saxon, she fights back and fights back hard enough that Mandalore gets glassed early. And that pushes her to a breaking point because she REFUSES to let her people just... scatter, she WILL hold them together if it's the last thing she does, and she WILL get vengeance on the Empire for what it's done to Mandalore.

And poor sweet pacifist Duchess Satine just spirals further and further into her own darkness, convinced that she's just doing what she has to, swearing that it's necessary in the name of justice. But if her own people start questioning her, if they try to stop her, well they're probably spies for the Empire and she's promised to take out the Empire as vengeance for what was lost.

[short-wooloo]

I've seen a few posts about how mandos hate child endangerment...

Guys

That's fanon

There is no indication that mandalorians hate endangering children anymore than any other group, culture, individual or responsible/sensible parent

If anything the opposite might be true, in both canon and legends it seems that mandalorians (the warriors anyways) consider a certain amount of endangerment to be acceptable-if not tacitly encouraged-in child rearing

[annemarieyeretzian]

of course essek wears a sleep mask. of course he does

[currentlyobsessedwithobi-wan]

I don’t hate Satine. I don’t like her either, I’m just let’s say neutral. And I don’t care what people ship (as I’ve said, I’ll read about any ship if the story is interesting enough). However I’m very much not a fan of the “Korkie is their secret child” theory. I guess I’m just not fan of the illegitimate children tropes to begin with. And maybe I’m biased, but I just can’t imagine Obi-wan having a child then acting as if they didn’t exist.

[impossibleprincess35]

When the first words out of someone's mouth about why they hate Satine includes the claim of genocide: